A free DeviantArt Downloader for galleries and favourites

Admin Monday, October 07, 2024.

UPDATE: While this tutorial still works, you are advised to use this alternative tutorial instead as it works much better. Thanks.

For anyone looking for a DeviantArt downloader, this is a quick tutorial that shows how to download from DeviantArt galleries and favourites in bulk. The tool I will be using to demonstrate this is called WFDownloader App. All you need to do is copy and paste the link of any DeviantArt gallery or favourite page (that you want to download from) into the application and do a search. After that, you can begin downloading the images and videos found. Here are some advantages of using WFDownloader App as your DeviantArt downloader:

Works on DeviantArt galleries, favourites, subscription, and scrap pages.
Will download both images and videos from DeviantArt.
The files downloaded are neatly named and organized for you.
Allows updating your DeviantArt downloads whenever you want with just a click. Only new items are downloaded.
Allows organizing (or grouping) your downloads into categories. This can be beneficial in updating multiple galleries however you like.
If you have list of multiple galleries to be downloaded, you can supply it as a list via batch link search. This works better in the alternative tutorial I already recommended.
Finally, its ease of use. No difficult to follow (or understand) steps involved.

A DeviantArt download example

Note that this tutorial is for casual downloaders. If you're going to be doing large-scale downloads, then you should read downloading via DeviantArt API instead otherwise you'll encounter the known issues/restrictions discussed in the next section below.

Rule of thumb: If the gallery or favourite you are trying to download has more than 500 items in it, you are not a casual downloader and this method isn't for you. Use the API method that was just linked or you'll definitely encounter the issues in the next section.

To download from DeviantArt, follow these steps:

Open the DeviantArt page whose images and videos you want to download. It could be any gallery or favourite page, whether individual ones or all.
Copy the link of the page from your browser address bar.
Open the application and click the blue "Add" button to paste the copied DeviantArt link.
Enter the "save folder" where you want the DeviantArt gallery or favourite to be downloaded and click "Confirm".
After the search is completed, click "Confirm".
Click the "Start" button to begin downloading the DeviantArt links found. The application will download everything neatly named and organized.

That should be about it for downloading from DeviantArt however, there are a few things you need to know so please read on.

Known issues you may encounter while downloading from DeviantArt

Quick tip. Because people kept asking the same questions over and over in the comment section, I've decided to repeat this again here. If you are trying to download a DeviantArt gallery or favourite that has more than 500 items, do not bother with this tutorial, but instead use the API method that was mentioned here. In summary, if you encounter any issues with this method, just use the API method (rather than trying to follow these instructions below), it's superior. Thanks.

DeviantArt has a lot of restrictions to prevent people from downloading recklessly from their site and because of that, things may not go for you as smoothly as was shown above. Here are a few issues and what to do:

None of the images are downloaded or some of them are missing. Some user galleries or favourites are not publicly viewable (i.e., you need to be logged in to view them). Also, some DeviantArt artists require you to follow them to be able to view their galleries. Because WFDownloader App is a separate application from your browser, it does not have access to your login status and will only see what anyone can see without being logged in. To make WFDownloader App access galleries that you're able to, you will have to import cookies into the application for DeviantArt. After that, the application will download the DeviantArt images without issue.
You are having issues downloading large DeviantArt galleries. You might discover that you can't completely download large galleries. This can happen if the gallery has more than 600 items. This is due to a DeviantArt restriction known as rate-limiting (which prevents people from downloading too many items within a short time). It temporarily blocks/bans the app and so the app won't work for a while (i.e., it won't find images anymore) until the ban expires. The only way to download large galleries or favourites from DeviantArt is to slow down the rate at which WFDownloader App crawls the site to grab the images. To do that, go to Options > General Settings > Values and set the value for “Delay between web page crawls” to 15 seconds or more depending on what works for you.
Another trick to downloading large galleries that didn't complete the first time is to continue from where you stopped. You can do this by appending a #number at the end of the link and that will make the app skip the beginning and start from that position. For example, https://deviantart.com/artist/gallery/all#456 will make the app start from that position. Just make sure to keep saving to the same folder each time so that you can estimate the next offset position by the number of items in the folder.
If you intend to use a DeviantArt account with the app (because access to some galleries requires login), it is better to use a dummy/throwaway account for this purpose. That way if eventually you get banned for overdoing things, it would be the dummy account and not your precious account.
If after trying everything above and you still cannot download from DeviantArt, it might be that the link scraper for DeviantArt has become outdated. Kindly report it to support to get it fixed.

Conclusion

Finally, you've been introduced to an easy-to-use DeviantArt downloader that works! Note that this downloader also works on other artist-focused sites such as ArtStation, Behance, VSCO, etc. If you tried this tutorial, let me know in the comment section whether it worked for you or not. Also, any suggestions are welcome. Thanks for reading!